Aitzaz & Co and the Hijacking of SCBA Elections

Reading about the SCBA elections, this bit gave me the giggles:

“Former president SCBA Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan has kept himself at distance from the bar politics. He had gone abroad and would not return till the polling day. However, Hamid Khan’s group is claiming his support. Lahore has gained significant importance in the polls, as almost half of the eligible voters are registered here.”

Ah, so this is how Aitzaz was had played it — the usual double-crossing way. That Hamid Khan was so naive is something I had not expected. To think that Aitzaz was “keeping himself at a distance from bar politics” and supporting Hamid Khan’s group was foolish to the extreme. Aitzaz (behind the scenes) and his cronies (openly) were certainly working for Asma Jehangir (also see Past Heros, Now Zeros and Past Heros, Now Zeros – II). Aitzaz of course was found standing on Asma’s podium at LHC on election day — so much for keeping himself at a distance. Also supporting/canvassing for her were Musharraf’s PCO judges.

Babar Awan:

The role Babar Awan too must not be over-looked. He distributed hundreds of millions to the bars and even managed to snag Qazi Anwar in the week before the election (How could Qazi be so stupid to accept the check from him and appear in the press with Awan is beyond me. And to top it off, Qazi returning the check a couple of days later certainly didn’t help).

Federal Law Minister Babar Awan, a close aide of President Asif Zardari also spent election day in Lahore and is (rightly) believe that the minister had come there to make last-minute “arrangements” for Asma’s election.

Let’s not also forget the stunt Babar Awan pulled a couple of days before the election: His meeting Chaudhry Pervaiz of PML-Q which started a media frenzy on the last day before SCBA elections and hogged all air time away from the elections.

Another name that needs mentioning is the other crooked PPP lawyer group of Latif Khosa which too was working for her.

BTW: Watch this clip of Aitzaz on one of the talk shows (News Beat With Meher Bokhari October 22th , 2010) before the election where he plays the innocent one:

Aitzaz begins (starting at about 3:54):

“Let me first commend you that you have managed to catch me when I am on the plane…um…Like Noon Meep Rashid said “Zaindagi say bhaag ker aaya houN main!” but zindagi has followed me here (in Spain)..”

Yes, Aitzaz! I believe you that our media is so good they can track and get hold of someone (who didn’t want to be found) IN A PLANE all the way over the skies in Spain (Curiously, why did he choose Spain to run to? Managing some legal matters for the other “Chaudhries of Gujrat” who have siphoned most of their monies there?)

Role of the Media:

The media certainly played a huge role in this victory for Asma. Of the tens of talk shows I watched, most featured only people from what I call the “Aitzaz Asma Zardari” group, pretending to be offering differing opinions but in fact going against the judiciary and the other group. I only saw three shows that featured the other group and that too in a very negative way. Two (including the one above) featured Qazi Anwar and one featured the other candidate Ahmed Owais (A hatchet job was performed on him by Kamran Shahid in Front Line, who had Owais on the phone and Asma in studio. Karman blatantly lied, attributing statements to Owais which he had never stated). In all such cases, the hosts seemed to be handed their talking points by the winning side.

After the election, we saw analysis like “The defeat of bigotry” to define Asma’s win. Huh? WTF?? The writer “is a lawyer and political commentator based in London”, Ayesha Khan is using another dirty trick played by Asma’s team and blaming the Hamid Khan group for it (“somebody” distributed pamphlets saying a vote for Asma was a vote for Qadyanis. Of course no one else was behind it but her team itself. At least it confirms her being a Qadyani, something I have heard about Aitzaz as well).

Salman Taseer’s Daily Times described the victory thus:

Asma Jahangir represents modern, progressive and forward-looking sections of Pakistani society across the globe. Her election to the office is bound to bring about a sea change in Pakistan’s perception around the world, as a state of strife struggling to counter the menace of Talibanisation of society.

Before the election, we also saw repeatedly items like:

People like Justice (retd) Tariq Mehmood, Abid Hassan Minto, Muneer Malik, Aitzaz Ahsan and others stand above politics. (Source)
[And let’s not forget to add Ali Ahmed Kurd and Athar Minallah to this list and the shame-of-all-shames Justice Fakharuddin G. Ibrahim]

Of course these were total lies as all those named (except Aitzaz of course 😉 ) were openly supporting Asma and campaigning for her and stood shoulder to shoulder with her of election day…

Notes:

Well, at least some other big “champions of truth” stand exposed. Now I had already written about the others but never suspected Fakhuruddin G. Ibrahim and Abid Hassan Minto to be part of the cabal. So it is pretty safe to say that all the names we know, we know why we know them: they have been hand-picked to easily insert themselves into any ‘threat’ that appears on the horizon and hijack any such movement.

Aitzaz of course is a master of this and the more I find out about him, the uglier the picture gets. Here I would like to point out a couple of things that I have become aware of lately that leave no doubt about him being a “Sayan”:

• Talking to some former school mates of his (Aitchison College, Lahore) I discovered that Aitzaz was ‘recruited’ way back in high school. I am told that back then Aitzaz was invited to every American Consulate function and they thought it was something odd though they could never put their finger on it.
• And do you know that Aitzaz had pulled the “I-was-thrown-out-of-PPP-but-now-I-am-back-with-PPP” trick that he pulled during the lawyers movement to gain their trust once before? Well, he did, and there his victim was none other than Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto himself. It happened during the PNA Movement against ZAB in 1977 (When Bhutto claimed the Americans were behind it, he was 100% correct. Let’s remember here Kissinger’s warning — “We’ll make an example out of you!” — to him and the fact that a lot of foreigners descended on Pakistan under the cover of being “reporters” and dollars flowed freely — so much so in fact that in those days of strict currency restrictions where you could buy dollars only from the State Bank, dollars were available on the street at lower than the currency exchange rate). Using the excuse about some lawyers being shot, he abandoned ZAB at that most crucial of times. He of course falsely claims he was “thrown out” of the party. What exposes that lie is that right after the coup by Zia ul Haq, he managed to rejoin PPP as a central leader (if he was really thrown out by ZAB, why would the party accept him at that trying time?). We see the same script being followed just before the second Long March, where he had managed to loose favor with the lawyers and they were openly accusing him for siding with Zardari against the movement. There he pulled the “thrown out of CEC bit by Zardari” and managed to sabotage the movement by calling off the Long March before it got to Islamabad (remember he was NOT part of the lawyers leadership at the time but it was he who made and announced the decision to stop on their part. The fool who was the leader at the time — Ali Ahmed Kurd — managed to get himself stuck in the middle of nowhere — at the Balochistan/Sindh border — leaving Aitzaz to make the call. It must also not be forgotten how Aitzaz just managed to insert himself into the vehicle of Nawaz Sharif that day and how Kiyani also called him instead of the lawyers’ leadership). Kurd today of course stands in the pocket of Aitzaz.
• The next chapter in this Aitzaz saga that must be remembered is his role in dismembering the Sikh resistance. Remember In July 1989, working as the Interior Minister under the Benazir Bhutto Government, Aitzaz Ahsan personally handed the complete list of Sikh activists who were working in league with Pakistani intelligence (so it couldn’t be with Pakistani intelligence’s ashirwat). Within weeks of his handing over the list the entire top Sikh brass that was working with Pakistan was eliminated, something from which the Sikh Seperatist Movement never recovered. So maybe when he gave that list of sikhs to India, he wasn’t following BB’s orders but those of the (common?) master, the US.

RELATED:
Asma Jahangir and Anti-Iftikhar Chaudhry forces win in SCBA
Reactionary Forces Win SCBA
Other Articles on Aitzaz on this blog

Past Heros, Now Zeros – II

(Just wanted to get this out. If time allows, will make changes/additions)

Past Heros, Now Zeros are busy exposing themselves further. That they have been bought is clear hearing their utterances against the Supreme Court and the Justices. They are busy appearing on every talk show speaking against the very same judges that they helped restore.

Ahmed Noorani did a followup story in the News:
Four lawyers support govt, without arguments

Kurd said that he believes in the apex court’s power of judicial review but, at the same time, he believes that the present judiciary could not review this 18th Amendment in the present circumstances.

Asked to elaborate the word ‘circumstances’, Kurd replied that he was a great supporter of the 18th Amendment and thus Supreme Court should not review this amendment. He said that at the time of the lawyers’ movement, top legal and constitutional minds were giving suggestions to Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry but now people around the Supreme Court were not ‘good’.

Views of Athar Minallah were harder. While talking to this correspondent, Athar said that he believes in the Constitution and according to Article 239 no amendment could be called into question before any court.

He said that only those people were supporting the judicial review and striking down of some clauses of the 18th Amendment who had been appearing before the court of Abdul Hameed Dogar.

Is Kurd calling himself “a great legal mind”? That is laughable! Is Minallah calling Ch Iftikhar “Dogar”? Amazing isn’t it? Not only do they have no argument, they have resorted to threatening the judges and on more than one occassion: See Aitzaz Threatens Supreme Court and watch April 21, 2010’s Capital Talk (the threat made to Akram Sheikh) and Apr 18’s Meray Mutabiq (the threat he made to Hafiz Pirzada. Some of it was reported in The News here). Of course Kurd is also now using the “damadum mast kalandar” threat against the judges and like Aitzaz, saying that if the court rules against the bastardized clauses of the 18th amendment that destroy the basic structure of the constitution and make the party heads above the constitution and all politicians above the law, they will have the judgment overturned and the judges can “imagine” what will happen to them..

That they have no arguments was further brought forward by what Justice Tariq Mehmood had to say in last night’s Capital Talk. Watch it and observe his behavior as well. He is all jumpy, and even goes on to blame the media that this is a non issue and offers this “advise”:

People are not interested in it. You guys are destroying your ratings by talking about it. As soon as people hear 18th Amendment on a show, they flip the channel. If you want to be watched, don’t talk about the 18th amendment.

Now that sure is rich. The legal expert has now become media marketing consultant. You can — and must — see more of him on last night’s Late Edition with Akram Sheikh.

Notes:
Why have these lawyers sold out? Well Aitzaz was always a sellout and having the BoP fraud and the LPG scam — he is a big beneficiary of both — being in front of the SC certainly has added to his displeasure. Having his dictates to the CJ fail certainly added to his change of heart (Note: the people he is standing with today — Awan, Khosa, etc. were all his partners in the BoP scam)

Similarly Kurd was expecting his ‘recommendations’ of people to be appointed judges to be dictates and when that didn’t happen, he cried foul (proof that he was sold long ago can be seen from his protestations against the court’s ruling against the NRO). Having failed to gain financially that way, he has chosen to sell himself like a kanjri from Heera Mandi and do mujras for Zardari, Babar Awan, Farooq Naek, and Latif Khosa (Note: BTW, has anyone else noticed the new wardrobe of Kurd? Suddenly he is all dressed up in new fine threads).

Exactly what was it that Athar Minallah and Tariq Mehmood were demanding is still not clear but I will assume something similar or maybe they just plain sold out for a quota or too. But let thee be no doubt that they have been sold.

RELATED:
Aitzaz, Akram spar over parliament
Petitions filed against 18th Amendment
SCBA also challenges 18th amendment
Haq’s appointment as Attorney General challenged

P.S. Should one laugh or cry:
Insiders reveal a resident Pir at the Presidency

Past Heroes, Now Zeroes

From The News

…“However, now when the Zardari-led government has violated the constitution, the lawyers leader who were made heroes by the people of the Pakistan sided with the presidency of Asif Ali Zardari and did not participate in Monday’s historic boycott by the lawyers,” a senior lawyer said.

He added: “These former leaders did not know that they became heroes because of their stance in support of the independent judiciary and because of the people. If they continue to oppose the lawyers’ struggle, not only the public but the new generation of lawyers will not forgive them”.

He said in the garb of saving the democracy, the former lawyers’ leaders are siding with worst ever dictatorship in civil dress. On the other hand four top leaders – Aitzaz Ahsan, Athar Minallah, Justice (R) Tariq Mehmood and Ali Ahmad Kurd – have their own views on the issues.

Despite absence of these leaders, Hamid Khan, Rasheed A Rizvi, Latif Afridi, Mehmoodul Hassan and present president of Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) Qazi Anwar, who are also the leaders of the historic lawyers’ movement in last three years, actively participated in Monday’s lawyers strike by keeping all the interests aside.

Justice (R) Tariq Mehmood was of the view that if the lawyers would have announced staging of protest in front of the Prime Minister House or the Presidency he would have been part of this protest but he is against boycott of the courts. “Now, there is an independent judiciary, so why we are boycotting the courts?”

Justice Tariq gave his reason for not participating in Monday’s lawyers’ protest. When asked that why he did not give this suggestion to the present leadership of the lawyers’ movement, he said whenever he expressed his views to this new leadership they simply listen to it and ignore it.

Ali Ahmad Kurd, when approached by this correspondent was of the view that he will not disclose the reasons for not participating in lawyers’ protest right now and will make his disclosures after three days.

Athar Minallah also said he would record his reasons later, while Aitzaz Ahsan did not respond to many calls and messages sent to him. Aitzaz was also specifically sent some questions, which also remained unanswered….”

Restoration is all it was, NOTHING more!

Ali Ahmed Kurd

Couple of days ago, Ali Ahmed Kurd spoke at a ceremony at the Supreme Court marking the start of the new judicial year and that has not gotten the attention it deserved. It is a very significant statement coming from the President Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and someone who led the movement for restoration:

President SCBA Ali Ahmad Kurd said all the segments of society had played their role in the restoration of judiciary and lawyers and common man had rendered unprecedented sacrifices for the rule of law. “But to my sight nothing had changed. A myriads of questions were brewing in the minds of the lawyers. The attitude of the judges and procedure of courts was the same what it was before the movement for restoration of judiciary was launched [“the same practice and the same attitude of judges from top to bottom is evident” as reported by another story]. People ask us what results have come out after the restoration of independent judiciary, he questioned. It was not correct to dismiss the cases in haste, he remarked. (source)

Mush Bush

Now he is someone who knows the real situation. This certainly is no surprise. The last Supreme Court decision that supposedly struck down Nov 3 acts of Musharraf could not have adhered more to the “Doctrine of Necessity“, despite what claims CJP Ifitkar M Chaudhry makes.

We all know the decision the court made soon after Musharraf restored him briefly (the court allowed him to get himself “elected” as President and in uniform on September 28, 2007). And Musharraf was using those powers on Nov 3 2007 given to him by the very same Supreme Court to shut it down.

CJ IMC & Mush

The latest decision of July 30th , though hailed as “historical” by many, was nothing of the sort and all it did was get rid of judges that short-changed the deposed judges. It has proven to be nothing but the justices protecting their turf, just like the sugar and cement and flour mafias.

So it is hardly unfair to say we are where we were on Nov 3. The only difference is the names on the salary checks of judges have changed.

Related:
Kurd sees no change after restoration of deposed judges

ISLAMABAD: Nothing has changed since the restoration of the deposed judiciary, Supreme Court Bar Association President Ali Ahmad Kurd said on Monday. Addressing a ceremony held at the Supreme Court to mark the beginning of the new judicial year, he said the same archaic practices were still being followed, adding that the behaviour and attitude of judges was also the same. He said judges had granted leaves in very few petitions and rejected others without proper hearings. staff report

THE Doctrine Of Necessity And Pakistan’s Poodle Judiciary